Twitter suing Homeland Security suggests some of those alt Twitter accounts were real after all

New legal documents show that Twitter is taking the Department of Homeland Security to court to protect the true identity of an account that claims to be run by employees of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. The account, @ALT_USCIS, is one of many “alt” government agency accounts that began appearing in the early days of the Trump administration.

“Specifically, on March 14, 2017, they issued and delivered to Twitter an administrative summons (the “CBP Summons”) demanding that Twitter provide them records that would unmask, or likely lead to unmasking, the identity of the person(s)responsible for the @ALT_USCIS account. The summons was issued by a Special Agent in Charge within U.S. Customs and Border Protection, another unit of DHS. The CBP Summons is unlawful and must be enjoined…”

It’s not immediately clear which of the account’s tweets were deemed particularly objectionable by DHS. Like many of the other alt accounts, @ALT_USCIS openly criticizes the policies pursued by the current administration.

“In the just over two months since it was created, @ALT_USCIS has frequently criticized the immigration policies of the new Administration, highlighted what the user views as a history of waste and mismanagement within USCIS and DHS, and publicized facts that the account’s users portray as casting doubt on Administration policies.”

To date there has been little evidence suggesting that any of these alt-agency accounts — and there are many — are actually run by the agency employees they claim to be, but Homeland Security’s decision to unmask this particular account raises questions about its potential legitimacy.